Legal Guardian
by BehrBeMine
Summary: A slip-slap of childhood memories carrying Michael on the way to letting go of the only piece of family he's ever thought he had.


Title: Legal Guardian  
Author: BehrBeMine  
Feedback: Would be lovely. behrbemine@hotmail.com  
Distribution: Into Oblivion, Rambling Muse. To archive anywhere else, just ask.  
Summary: A slip-slap of childhood memories carrying Michael on the way to letting go of the only piece of family he's ever thought he had.  
Rating: PG  
Pairing: No pairing. Involves Michael.  
Improv: #16 - - forgive, innocence, pear, wisp  
Disclaimer: I don't own anything. Don't sue, I'll cry. ;p  
Spoiler: 'Independence Day'  
  
The judge congratulates me on becoming an emancipated minor. The pen in my hand hovers above the line where I'm supposed to sign my name. I'll finally be on my own, away from Hank's bullshit and fists. Isabel and Max smile from their seats close to mine, even happier for me than I am for myself.  
  
All I'll have to keep are my memories of Hank. Of the times his belt slapped onto my skin, of the grunts and the insistence that I do nothing, that I am worth nothing. I know that these thoughts of him will forever keep me from being able to forgive what a mess he made of my childhood. My hand shakes a little as I concentrate on the words typed onto the paper before me. If only getting out on my own meant throwing the memories away.  
  
- - -  
  
There was a banging coming from the other side of the wall. My eyes widened as I sprung up from my place on the dirty carpet. In the process, I sent my crumpled-up pages of mediocre sketches flying across the room. "Damnit..."  
  
The banging came again. My eyes widened further. If Hank heard, he was going to be pissed off. I wanted more than anything for the noise to stop. Who was banging on the fricken wall? I rushed out of the bedroom, hurrying past the cluttered front room, where the black-and-white TV erupted with sound-machine laughter. From his chair in the corner of the room, Hank snored.  
  
Taking care not to bump him and risk his temper, I eased my way out the front door, catching the screen door from behind before it could slam loudly into the door frame. Carefully I eased it back until I heard the latch click, and then I scampered to the side of the house, to the outside wall of my bedroom.  
  
Another boom came as I rounded the corner, sending stray rocks skittering across the alley. "Knock it off!" I yelled fiercely as I approached the kid who was standing beside the trailer. He turned, looking startled. It was Max.  
  
"Sorry, I just... I wanted you to come outside."  
  
The heat of June sunlight fell from above to bake the skin of my bare shoulders as I nodded. School let out last week. Seventh grade was over with. It had been a long year. For me, at least. Summer had been so long in coming. "Well don't kick the side of the house. Hank's asleep."  
  
"Hank's always asleep." Max's face broke into a smile as he placed an arm over my shoulder. "Nice shirt," he teased, tugging at the thin fabric of my tank top that was white before the stains set in.  
  
I scowled, giving his attire a look-see, and my contempt showed through in my face. I preferred my style any day.  
  
"So, you gonna sleep over tonight?" Max asked as we began walking, heading out of the trailer park. I wondered why he asked; I slept over there nearly every night. "Well it's just, my mom's sick. And you might catch it. I'm just warning you."  
  
I didn't know much about Max's mom. I'm not much of a parent person. They hate me. "What's she sick with?"  
  
"I don't know, Isabel said people get the flu sometimes... She's making Mom chicken noodle soup. She said to tell you about Mom in case you wanted to stay away for awhile."  
  
I shrugged, not worried in the least. "We don't get sick."  
  
"We might."  
  
"It's okay, I don't care... I like sleeping at your house."  
  
Max smiled at me. "I know."  
  
I smiled back, and we walked on toward the Evans house. Max's arm felt good around my shoulders. Brotherly. As we passed by a beat-up old stop sign, I wondered if Hank liked chicken noodle soup.  
  
- - -  
  
Two lines of tables were set up against the walls, all the way down the hallway. It was too crowded. Kids mingled around with their parents in tow, with either excitement or disgusted looks on their faces. And Mrs. Deevers walked past me holding a thick stack of blue ribbons in her hand. Eighth grade science fair.  
  
Everybody had to do a project. I didn't do mine. Ran out of time. Didn't actually plan on doing it from the start, but I might have eventually if the fair date hadn't come upon us so soon. I stood beside Max and his partner, Steve Redd. They mixed some solutions or something, came up with a strange color. I don't know; I didn't really care to ask.  
  
I looked all around me in a bored way, leaning back on the table that supported the diagram Maxwell spent hours perfecting. Isabel neared the table, looking almost as bored as myself, with her parents directly behind her. She didn't have to do the science fair; she had done it last year. She read over the carefully typed words that were glued onto Max's posterboard, and then grinned in a weird way. "Geeze, Max, there's so much information on here. You're gonna grow up to be a science geek."  
  
Max laughed and rolled his eyes. "No I'm not. Steve did most of the work." Steve nodded in confirmation.  
  
Isabel giggled and slapped her brother on the shoulder playfully. "Well whatever, you guys aren't going to win anyway. Miss Science has apparently been working on this for months or something." She was speaking of Liz Parker, of course. Everyone knew Liz was into science. Max could tell you about a thousand other things that she was into; he watched her every move like an obsessed puppy.  
  
I looked over to the table where Liz's project was displayed. The principal, one of the three judges, stood before her, surveying the contents spread out in an obviously planned-out fashion. Liz looked nervous, but her friend Alex, her partner for the project, stepped forward to wrap his arm around her shoulders from behind, pulling her back to him and hugging her as reassurance. He whispered something in her ear, probably something along the lines of, "Don't worry - - you're a shoe-in," and her eyes lit up.  
  
Suddenly feeling a bit sad, I turned my attention back to Max, hoping to talk to him about doing something together this weekend. But he was busy talking to Isabel, who brushed a wisp of hair behind her ear. They were casually arguing about some silly thing as their mother pulled out her camera. "Stop fighting with your brother, Is, this is a big day for him. Now, get close together, all three of you, I want a picture. Steve, come on, squeeze in there. All right, smile!"  
  
They did, and the flash was more than Isabel expected, because she blinked rapidly afterwards and mumbled, "God, now I remember why I always used to hate that camera."  
  
Max laughed and said something about getting her eyes checked if a simple flash of a camera bothered them so much. "Hey, maybe they'll give you glasses," he joked. Isabel looked mortified, and Max recoiled. "All right, all right, I take it back - - you'd be a contacts girl, Is."  
  
Mr. Davis came along to pin a third place ribbon on Max and Steve's posterboard. Isabel shrugged indifferently. "Told you you wouldn't win."  
  
"Oh don't be silly, third place is wonderful," Mr. Evans piped in, pulling his son to his chest for a hug. As if on cue, Mrs. Evans pulled Isabel closer to her, smiling at both of her children. I stood back unnoticed and asked myself why my life had to be so much different.  
  
- - -  
  
At the age of sixteen, my days were the same. The same monotonous pattern of events passed by in the hours of each wretched day. It was rare when I woke up in the morning to find myself not on Max's bedroom floor, but one autumn day I opened my eyes and had to soak in my surroundings before realizing I had crashed on the couch the night before. Hank's couch, in Hank's trailer. It was Hank's, not mine; I didn't want it to be mine.  
  
I groaned and dragged myself up to a stand, stretching my aching joints and popping my stiff neck. I would've glanced at the time, but there were no clocks here. "No use for 'em, just clutter up the damn place," Hank would say. It really didn't make much of a difference to me.  
  
I pulled on the shirt that laid crumpled up on the floor and then headed over to the single window, ripping off the dirty dish towels that had been blocking out the sun. From his sprawled-out position on the floor, Hank's tired eyes squinted up at me in annoyance. "Hurts my eyes in the morning, boy, shut the damn light out!" I rolled my eyes, but hung the dish towels back in their place over the dirty glass.  
  
Feeling as frustrated as ever, I glared at all that was around me, from the beat-up old couch I had just vacated to Hank's stretched-out body on the floor that desperately needed to be vacuumed. I didn't even think we had a vacuum. Didn't take me long to decide I couldn't stick around there all day. There was nowhere to go in that trashy trailer that would give me some peace and quiet.  
  
There were five rooms in Hank's trailer: there was the living room, populated by a twenty year-old couch that was stained with old beer and losing stuffing out of every cushion; there were two bedrooms, one of them mine, though you couldn't tell by looking at it with its plain walls and empty drawers; there was the kitchen, with its leaky faucet that hadn't been fixed since I'd lived there, and its constant pile of dirty dishes, caked with old food that was growing mold and other such unmentionables; and there was the bathroom, forever smelling of vomit and shaving cream. It was where I lived.  
  
Feeling too angry about my life to hunt down something resembling food, I raked a hand through my hair and stomped out the front door, wincing when it slammed shut too loudly for one of the neighbors, prompting me to yell an angry "Same to you!" before continuing out of this place that was my personal hell.  
  
It was the last day of summer vacation, the last day before sophomore year started. Max wanted to pick up lunch at The Crashdown, not because their food was the least bit edible, but because Liz worked there. Liz. Goddamn. But I had nothing better to do, and so I told him I'd come with him and chow down while he stalked her with his eyes.  
  
I thought it must be nice to adore someone like that. But I just had to give a shrug of innocence because I wouldn't know.  
  
- - -  
  
Hank walked into the room, into MY room. "Get out!" I wanted to say. But I didn't.  
  
He staggered, lost in the drunken state that had become his trademark. His eyes were wild and unfocused; his posture revealing just how many beers he'd swigged before passing out the night before. "Where were you last night?" he barked, glaring at the wall behind me. It made it easier the way he looked at things around me, but not actually at me. I never questioned why he did that. "Where were you?" he asked again when no answer came.  
  
I looked all around myself from my spot on the floor, shrugging in an offhand way. "Right here."  
  
He nodded his head, then shook his head, then did something that could be called a bit of both. He seemed confused, as he always did. "I was looking for you."  
  
"Should've looked here."  
  
"Don't give me that, boy." He stopped and raised his eyes to look at the bare walls that closed in the space that I've always hated with a passion. He seemed to be considering saying something else, but he stopped, and grunted.  
  
I stared at the man who raised me on booze and strange women, who had chosen the oddest times to show bits of affection toward me. I didn't hate him; I don't know what I felt for him. He was not my father; he wasn't even a proper substitute for a father. But he was something to me. I didn't love him... but I could never hate him.  
  
No, I definitely don't hate him.  
  
He's all I've ever known.  
  
Hank made an indistinguishable sound, something akin to a gurgle, as he swayed slightly off-balance in the broken doorway to my near-empty bedroom. "Oughtta be around when I call for you, boy; oughtta be..." He continued to mutter things that didn't hold significance for me as he turned around and started away.  
  
- - -  
  
An eleven year-old Isabel put on her sunglasses and laid back in the rich green grass of the park, taking a bite of the pear in her hand. She sighed, unnerved by the silence. "Why are you being so quiet today? It's getting annoying."  
  
Her face was turned toward the sky above, but I knew her words were directed at me. Beside me, Max picked up clumps of grass, tossing them to either side just for lack of a better thing to do. I didn't answer until Isabel turned her face to glare at me from behind her tinted shades. To simmer her wrath, I blurted out, "What's it like to have a dad?"  
  
Max continued picking at the grass, though he pursed his lips and looked troubled. Isabel turned her head back into place, gazing up at the puffy white clouds. "I don't know what you mean."  
  
"You do."  
  
Max raised his head to look me in the eyes. His voice was as young as mine, but sometimes I supposed he knew a lot more than he let on. "I'm sorry Hank's not like a real dad."  
  
We didn't talk about my life much. We avoided the subject of Hank at all times. I knew that Max and Isabel felt bad that I ended up where I did, while they ended up where they did, and so I tried not to drag them down with all that was messed up in my life. But sometimes I asked things, and I really wished they'd give me a real answer. Just so I could know what it was like - - to have parents, to be loved that much.  
  
I knew Isabel was mad that I brought one of those untouchable subjects up, so I was surprised when her voice came out soft and caring. "Maybe someday you'll have a dad, too, Michael."  
  
- - -  
  
I always wanted a family. A mother, a father; people to love me unconditionally because, really, how else can anyone love ME?  
  
But Isabel places her hand on mine, reassuring me with the simplest touch, and her smile is warm as I glance at her face. I realize now that I do have a family in Max and Isabel. For whatever reason, they love me, and they care what happens to me. We're three of a kind; the only three teenage aliens we know of in this world.  
  
I hurriedly scribble my signature down on the piece of paper, releasing my death grip on the pen in my hand. There; it's done now. Hank is no longer a part of my life, and the best thing about it is that I don't need him to be anymore.  
  
- -  
end 


End file.
